Just played and finished it. Granted, I spoiled myself silly beforehand (which is what made me want to play it...). Got Pacifist (+ all yellow credits!). Zero interest in Genocide; I'm the kind of person who would've gone Pacifist whether I'd have been spoiled or not since I'm just that nice, and so I'd really gain nothing from it - I'm satisfied with my lot, thanks. I'll just give my timeline their happy ending. :3
Great game. Here's my review:
Good points:
- I'm a sucker for characterisation anyway, and boy is the main cast here great. Love 'em all and can't really pick a favourite, which is an acheivement. They'll be sure to stick with me going into next year, and probably longer. If only there had been date scenes for everyone - the three we got were fantastic (four, if Sans' count). I think they got the balance of flaws and strengths right for all the core cast - even the antagonists who do want to kill the main character end up being sympathetic, which makes a Pacifist route all the more satisfying - and I've heard they become heroes in Genocide which also fits them very well! It's a hugely varied cast but all the connections and relationships between each other are endearing and everyone has a role to play in the story no matter which version it is.
- The soundtrack is excellent as well (made sure to buy that and put a selection of tunes on my phone - so good to listen to). Chiptuney but with great melodies and recurring themes, with nice orchestration as well. The first, fourth and fifth boss themes are probably my favourite, but even the area themes are lovely to listen to.
- The dodging mechanic is pretty neat - might need a little more polishing, but as a mechanic it's fine - and compensates for Pacifist routes when you don't level up and so don't get more HP as the enemies get stronger. I only died five times in Neutral (though probably five times against the Pacifist final boss alone...) but never more than once against any boss other than that and each time I could work out where I went wrong as opposed to simply getting stuck and frustrated. The various boss heart colours shake it up a bit as well to make those encounters more interesting and memorable. The attacks are also used to reflect the characters in various ways, which is an interesting way to do things as well!
- The humour is very to my liking - very sarcastic and character based with a few bad puns thrown in for good measure. Even after seeing each joke several times, it was still entertaining even if I didn't laugh out loud.
- I've heard of a lot of deconstruction games that tend to punish players for committing a morally wrong action that the game itself forces you into. I like how this one gives you the choice. Indeed, the idea of a game where you can take nonviolent solutions to defeating your enemies was one I considered before but found impractical for an RPG type game - I'm glad to see that it works so well.
- Even though it's sprite based, it's not in your face about being retro, instead just having a pleasant nostalgic feel - and I haven't even played any NES/SNES/original Gameboy games! The character design on the whole is also pleasant to look at, with a nice, simplistic and cartoony feel to it.
- The story is also very good, it's made up of differing segments per area that are nicely interwoven through the characters themselves, creating an almost episodic structure with plenty of variety in each part while still feeling consistent and as part of the same story. Each segment has both humour and heart, and the ending I got was sweet and cheesy in the best possible way. The backstory is intriguing and explains a lot without being complicated, and the same goes for the main story as well - it's not that there's a lot going on, it's that it's made engaging and meaningful through the dialogue and characters. The little extra tidbits of backstory and dialogue you find just makes the core story all the sweeter.
- As well as the 'bigger' secrets, like a couple of locked rooms and Temmie Village and whatnot, I love the little details that the game puts in to react to odd things you may have done to give it life or just a bit of humour. I ended up getting all the things I wanted done in my playthrough anyway so I have no reason to go back, but it's stuff like this that make each person's games more unique and personalised to them - whether it's if you preferred cinnamon or butterscotch or if you maybe had your playthrough with pink names when sparing enemies rather than yellow (as I did!). It just makes it so much more of a fulfilling experience when there's stuff to mess around with a bit outside of the important stuff.
I do have a few criticisms, though:
- I don't think the Neutral endings are particularly well written. Well, okay, some of them are, such as the ones where nobody dies, but after looking them up a lot of them feel lacklustre. Which I get why, they want you to go Pacifist and see the real ending, but they should still stand on their own even then. More to the point, I think they're very disproportionate as well - the endings don't necessarily get worse the more people die, which seems weird for such a morality based game like this. I don't think it really fits the theme of the player's actions having consequences when a) you can kill several important people and still have the underground being pretty well off and b) a lot of the problems the underground experiences in these endings are to do with who survived to become leader than the void left by the dead, which can lead to weird circumstances where killing off a character gives you a better ending than if they lived. Special mention goes to the Mettaton endings, which exaggerate the character's flaws far beyond what we've seen in the rest of the story and completely ignore his good points to the point of being HORRIFICALLY out of character.
- While the bosses and minibosses are very memorable, not all of the random enemies are, and I particularly found the late game (Hotland/Core) ones to be lacking in terms of design and personality. The Ruins enemies can get away with being plain, Snowdin's enemies are designed by the excellent Magnolia Porter (I'm a fan of her webcomic) and many of Waterfall's at least get a bit of character development on the side - meanwhile, I didn't find Tsunderplane to be interesting since it's a bit too explicit of an anime reference, and the Core's weren't all that quirky in terms of design or sparing mechanic to me. I think some more enemies could do with background info or out of the box sparing methods (not to the point of the bosses, but unusual actions or combinations thereof).
- Some elements, such as certain puzzles like Snowdin and Hotland (not Papyrus' puzzles or the TV segments, the non plot important ones) or the inclusion of so many dog minibosses, can get a bit old (albeit not completely frustrating). I think a run button would have been a nice inclusion as well since backtracking can be tedious, particularly towards the end of the game when you might have to walk through entire areas again which can take ages.
- There's a particular, highly spoiler based character that frustrates me. Long story short, their personality, nature and even if they have an active presence in the story contradict each other on both extreme routes, and as a result I have difficulty figuring out what this character is supposed to even be like. This is an issue since this character is of critical importance to the background of the story itself and also the main message to an extent due to what they represent. It feels like another example of the story sacrificing its characters - the strongest element of it - to make a point, in addition to my first complaint. It'd be nice if more about this character was clarified in the story, such as why they differ so wildly.
- The integration of the story and gameplay ranges from clever to a bit intrusive. In particular, I liked their take on the levelling system because it was an interesting spin on things that made sense from an in universe perspective. I felt that saving, on the other hand, felt kind of intrusive in a way that took me out of the universe a bit, particularly near the end of the Neutral version of the story. While I commend the game for playing with RPG conventions a bit, I don't feel fully comfortable with the wonderful world and characters it created being reduced to just a game even in the context of the universe it set up.
Even despite my complaints (which are either minor quibbles or only matter when taking routes other than my Pacifist one into account), it's probably one of my favourite games this year, if not ever - 9/10 worthy at least. If you like stuff like Paper Mario, I'd highly recommend this. (Though it won't affect my views on other RPGs like Pokemon... If the enemies only get knocked out rather than explicitly killed like in Underle, then I don't think the message really applies, does it?)